Life Imitates Art
by librarynerd
Summary: Sofia finds some paint and makes her own kind of masterpiece.


Title: Life Imitates Art

Author: librarynerd (nerdfightergirl)

Rating: K+

Summary: Sofia finds some paint and makes her own kind of masterpiece.

Disclaimer: I very happily do not own these characters. I just like to take them out for a spin now and then.

**For Gorm, who is the light in my darkness. I love you.**

* * *

Arizona woke slowly from her late afternoon nap. It was only once she moved to kiss her daughter that she noticed that something wasn't quite right. Instead of the soft black hair, her lips brushed against a smooth pillowcase. She leaned back and blinked a few times, confused, before popping out of bed and calling out, "Sofia?" She strapped on her leg and walked out to the living room, hoping Sofia had just wandered over to the corner where they kept her toys and kept herself busy while waiting for her sleepy mama to wake up.

She bit back some strong language when she saw what Sofia was actually doing. Her beautiful, perfect, content little girl was happily covered head to toe in paint, which she had also spread out onto the floor beneath her, a toddler-style mix of blue, red, and purple paint. She didn't have to think long about where Sofia got the paint (Sofia-approved painting supplies were always kept on the highest shelf, far out of her reach.) before she spotted the jars and another question entered her mind. How had the flavored body paint gotten into the apartment in the first place? It was not something she and Callie had ever tried before. At least, not something they'd tried together.

What Arizona saw next was icing on the cake. Sofia appeared to have finished her painting and was trying to clean up, using a currently heavily stained with paint piece of purple lingerie that she also didn't recognize. "Oh, Sofia."

"Mama! I paint!" Sofia declared happily, acknowledging her mom's presence.

"I see that," Arizona said tentatively, trying to remain calm. Escalating the situation would only leave them both in tears. "Why don't we get you all cleaned up now?" It wasn't like she could punish Sofia for this. She really didn't know better. But the question of how she got the paint and lingerie remained. Pushing it to the side temporarily, Arizona stepped closer to Sofia, preparing to start cleaning the mess up.

Unconcerned with getting it on herself (a lazy Saturday afternoon nap meant she was wearing shorts and an old t-shirt anyway), she picked Sofia up and walked her to the bathroom, making sure she didn't touch anything along the way. She put down a towel before plopping Sofia down on it. Then she leaned into the shower to start the water and get it warm. Sofia, used to this process, started to tug her clothes off as best she could. After some quick assistance, Sofia was undressed and waiting. Noticing that she, too, had paint on her from carrying Sofia, Arizona lifted Sofia into the shower and quickly stripped off her own clothes and her leg before settling into her shower chair. After a quick rinse to get most of the paint off of them, she put some of Sofia's soap on the washcloth and handed it to her before preparing one for herself. With a little help from Mama, soon mother and daughter were both clean and ready to tackle the next part.

After getting herself and Sofia redressed, Arizona set her up playing with the only thing currently capable of occupying Sofia for long enough to allow Arizona to clean up the paint without Sofia coming to get herself dirty again: Mama's stethoscope.

She got the cleaning supplies out from under the sink and got to work. The first order of business was the lingerie. She pulled on the giant rubber gloves before reaching down to pick up the purple lace number. A quick check of the tag told her that it was Callie's. Or at least it had been meant for Callie, but she certainly would have remembered seeing Callie in that. With a confused frown, she dumped the ruined lingerie into the trash can. Now for the hard part. She cursed the wood floor she normally loved as she thought about the work it would take to get all the paint off of it.

She had just gotten set up to mop up the paint when Callie came strolling in the door, finally free of the hospital after being paged in that morning. Taking in the scene of Arizona preparing to mop the floor, she halted for a moment before saying, "Uhhh … Hi, honey! I'm home!"

Hearing Callie's voice, Sofia abandoned her plaything and ran into the living room, "Mommy!" As fascinating as the stethoscope was (and as rarely as she was allowed to play with it), it didn't hold a candle to having her mom nearby. Callie scooped her up, noting the still-wet hair covering her head and seeing a similarly damp head on her wife. "Uh oh. Did someone make a mess?"

"I paint!' Sofia repeated.

"I swear, Calliope. I didn't get the paints out. I don't even know where she got these. It's flavored body paint and we've never used that before. But somehow, she found some and she woke up from her nap before I did and she painted the floor and herself. And then she tried to clean it up by herself, so I guess that's a good sign, but she wasn't making much progress trying to use lingerie to clean up paint, so I cleaned her up and now I'm cleaning the rest of the mess up." She went to start in on the large "masterpiece" in the middle of the floor when Callie stopped her.

"Wait!" Arizona froze and looked up. "Did you take pictures first?" Arizona sighed in relief when Callie wasn't upset. While consciously, she knew that Callie wouldn't get upset over something like this, getting over a childhood with The Colonel wasn't easy.

"No. I was just focused on getting it cleaned up before you got home."

"Arizona, she's a kid. Messes happen. It's not your fault. If anything, it's my fault for leaving the paint somewhere she could reach." Callie realized a second too late the truth she had injected into the conversation.

"About that …" Arizona trailed off, unsure how to ask about it.

"I, uh, I bought it for us. For … our reunion after Idaho. And then I got the phone call from Owen, so I just threw it all in the bottom of the closet. I haven't even thought about it in months. I swear I was going to get rid of it. I just … forgot."

"Oh. Well, uhh, why don't you get some pictures so I can finish cleaning this up?" That was not a conversation she was prepared to have right at that moment. So she waited silently while Callie grabbed their camera and took pictures of Sofia's masterpiece. The two of them stayed silent as Arizona cleaned and Callie listened as Sofia recounted her very exciting day. After the paint was all gone and the containers tossed in the trash, Arizona figured she couldn't avoid the conversation any longer.

"How about I make dinner and we can … talk?" Arizona tested the waters.

"Yeah, let's talk. I'll help with dinner."

They quickly settled into their typical pattern, dividing up the food preparation with ease while Sofia played in the living room.

"So …," Arizona started. "You bought paints. And lingerie."

"Yeah. I was going to surprise you. And then when Owen called, I just kind of threw them in the bottom of the closet. I'm actually surprised it took this long for someone to unearth them. I wasn't trying to hide it from you. I hadn't even thought about it in months. What was she doing in the closet anyway?"

"I don't know. We were taking a nap and she woke up early. I must have been pretty exhausted because I didn't wake up when she climbed out of our bed. I don't know why she went for the closet, but she clearly found something she wanted."

"Well, they did paint in daycare this week. That must have given her the idea." Callie gestured over to the watercolor paintings covering the fridge.

"Yeah, I figured that much out."

"I'm sorry," Callie interjected after a too-long silence.

"For what?"

"I should have gotten rid of the paints and the lingerie before Sofia could find them. I just didn't think."

"Callie, it's okay," Arizona assured her. "I'm not mad. A little disappointed we never got to try the paints, but not mad."

"You'd, uh, you'd still be up for trying them?" Callie figured they'd be off the table after this revelation.

"Yeah. I mean, if you want to try them. At some point. We don't have to do it now. Just, you know, whenever."

"Let's just make sure Sofia doesn't get a hold of them next time."


End file.
